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and I just wanted to make something clear–the only thing affiliate marketing has in common with Multi-Level Marketing is the word “marketing.”

In affiliate marketing, you sign up with an affiliate company and you sell their stuff on a commission. Depending on what they’re selling, you could make money just for people signing up for something (zip submits or email submits they’re usually called) or sometimes just when someone clicks on an ad—PPC, or Pay Per Click. Personally, I do CPA Marketing which is when you get a payout when a customer buys something. To clarify, these “people” and “customers” I refer to are never anyone I know–this kind of stuff is done through stuff like mass emails, banner ads, and google adwords. If you check your bulk mail right now almost everything you’re seeing are CPA offers. For example, for a while I was doing the Phentramine Pill–every time someone ordered the free trial of the pills by clicking on the advertisement I paid for on Google or Yahoo, I made $30. It’s a very lucrative business but it definitely fits the definition of “It take money to make money.” Never, ever money you have to pay to affiliate companies, but rather the money you have to spend to advertise. And the smarter you get and the longer you do it, the cheaper it becomes to advertise–it’s one of those things you learn as you go along.

I’m a member of this group not because I ever joined a MLM but because I live in Utah and it’s hard to live here and not know someone who isn’t a member of one. I had one friendship in particular that completely fell apart because of my lack of interest in joining ACN. I have a step-brother who lost thousands of dollars in some real estate mlm scheme and he is still delusional enough to defend it–he thinks he was the one who failed, not the business plan. I would never endorse anything I thought was anything like a MLM, even ones I consider more “innocent” like the, oh I can’t think of the name, but the housewares stuff. I have family that sale it and they make an okay side income, but on principle I’m still opposed to it and almost never go to the parties.

My point–affiliate marketing is not MLM, period. But it does cost money (in advertising expenses). And often the stuff you’re selling is total crap. Like the Phentramine pill I mentioned. I ordered some just for fun and it’s just a huge caffeine and B-12 pill that kept me awake for 24 hours–total rip off, imo–which is why I stopped selling it.
As for doing surveys with Clickbank, I don’t know anyone who makes real money doing surveys, but I know people, including myself, who make real money getting others to sign up to take surveys. 😉
I’d be happy to answer any questions anyone has about affiliate marketing if you want to send me a PM–but I’m still getting my feet wet so I’m hardly an expert. And don’t worry, I won’t respond with a link for you to sign up for anything.

Chances are your land may be part of the Haynesville shale that is being so hotly sought after right now. One of my attorney clients represents people here that have been ripped off by “lease hounds” who don’t actually work directly for the companies doing the lease (they turn around and actually lease to the companies–kinda doing a sublease with you.) Most leases specify whether they can be renewed, how deep they can drill and how much in royalty. We’ve been offered an annual fee, plus a sign on bonus and production percentage. I’d check to see if the people you signed with were actually representing the company doing the drilling or not.

A lot of our neighbors said they didn’t sign a lease because they wanted to consult an attorney first. The only reason we didn’t is because we were behind paying our mortage and we had a sky high electric bill last month. You can only imagine our surprise when someone showed up on our doorstep and said we will give you a check for $2100 today if you sign a lease. The downside is, we are not going to get hardly anything in royalties when they do drill. If we owned a lot of land, then you would get a whole lot more.

a) Have a title search for “mineral rights” for the property that you own. Until that is done, everything else is moot;
b) Take a copy of that lease to a local attorney that specializes in oil and gas leases, and have him/her explain every clause in it, to you. And what his recommendation is.

Oil and gas leases are _extremely_ tricky. It wouldn’t be inappropriate to get a second opinion on the legal aspects of the lease you are offered.

We live in TX and we got approached by an energy company to sign a lease with them for to drill for natural gas and oil near our land. They gave us a sign on bonus of $2100. They said that if anything is found, you will get a 25% royalty. But, that 25% is spilt among thousands of people. According to my calculations, the most we will get is hopefully about $50-100 per month which is better than nothing. More than I made in any mlm! We don’t own a lot of land, Our house is not big and we just have .145 acres, so we are not going to get much. For any of you who did do this, how much of a royalty check did you get? They say it will take months and months before they actually get the well set up and start the drilling process.

MLMers have started using it as a scapegoat label. Anything they don’t want to hear (or their brain eating masters don’t want them to think about) is “negative.” That means if you have any important facts or truth about some upslime that they should hear, they can call it negative and not have to think about it.

They forget to make an intelligent decision, one needs to know the benefits AND draw backs to any situation. Whenever anyone tells you something is just “it” then you know there’s a side to it they’re not telling you.

Im really not looking for a reason to join a new MLM with this post. I have the thought of, “why doesn’t the system work”, for the two I have been involved in. A lot of what I hear sounds promising but… Im here looking for an outlet for my concerns really. Everytime I try to talk to someone about an MLM they either dont know anything or they dont want to talk about anything negative period(usually the upline or anyone currently invested).

I’m not the most seasoned when it come to MLM’s but i know enough by now. At this point im involved with one MLM and considering another which is in the title of this topic. Im starting this thread for input on this company or to see if anyone has found information pertaining to the business aspect of this company. Also, any Pre-Paid associates out there? PFL is a relatively new one only a couple of months old from what I gather.

They are trying to “cut back” to make themselves more profitable. I wonder if all the lawsuits are costing them too much money? Primerica in essence does not cost a dime because they don’t pay for overhead or salaries. What is even more interesting is nobody wants to buy Primerica. Nobody. I wonder if they will just end up severing the relationship and leaving it at that.

Remember my story in which my boyfriend was involved with Primeri Inc.? Well to give you all an update, we just broke up an hour ago. He got laid off from his company and he is flying back to Illinos. He says he is going to start computer programming again, but I think he will probably end up in another MLM.

Anyway having spent the better part of 3 years with this guy I am wondering if thier is anyone (preferably female) who would like to hang out and talk about MLM’s face to face. I live in Orlando.

You need to read Steve Hassan’s books on cults and helping people get out of them – you can find them on second hand on Amazon or bookfinder.com. Cults don’t have to be religious organisations, there are commercial cults as well.

If he is using phrases like ’employee mentality’ Primerica are obviously using the same script as Amway/Quixtar. In all the meetings I attended they were always putting down J.O.B.s

Make sure your own finances are protected. Don’t support his business in any way. Make sure you don’t have any joint accounts or liabilities for bills.

Presenting him with negative information on Primerica probably won’t work, but asking lots of questions, to which he has to find out fhe answers, may. Such as, how are the higher-ups making their money? Can any of them prove, by tax forms, that they are making money? Is there a ‘training system’ in Primerica which generates income for someone?

I did a commission only job for a while – selling advertising space on the telephone. I did make good money at this but I needed to constantly program myself with positive self-talk in order to get through the days when everyone hung up on me. He may find some of the reputable books on selling helpful, assuming the computer company he’s with is a good one. You can probably find some in the library. However, if he’s still not sold anything after several months his confidence must be rock-bottom and that’s a vicious circle when it comes to sales.

Perhaps suggest that he looks for another programming job which pays a salary, just to get him through the next few months.

I know he’s probably been taught that ‘winners never quit’ but remember that the height of stupidity is to continue to do the same thing and expect to get a different result.

I’ve been with 3 different MLM’s in over a span of 17 years (including Primer) and believe me, I gave the MLM theory of that trickle down commission every opportunity to work and I hope all these unscrupulous companies take a hard nose dive in the court of law. In some ways if you actually take a closer look, any of these sales reps and their downline are indirectly working under a illegal pyramid scheme.

It’s a shame it takes near bankruptcy to finally see the theory of ‘more coming in than going out’. I could never understand why so many professionals with college degrees that takes years to earn,quit their lucrative jobs for an unproven system. I first tried out my marketing skills in ’80 at age 20 when I was in the work force with no college so I didn’t throw away a college degree or tuition.

But honestly, I can’t conduct business with a friend by selling shampoo or term life insurance. It just doesn’t seem comfortable for me to take my neighbors’ money in this nature. It certainly took a while for my friends to talk to me again after I gave up the chase.(and tell your boyfriend: yes I even made many cold calls so I didn’t go just one route. Attended many seminars locally and afar costing thousands and chasing prospects over hundreds of miles traveled !! I was just as determined as he is.)

I even had my girlfriend as partner in the business in my final attempt in ’95. I figured a multi award-winning car salesperson should find promoting MLM products easy. How advantageous was my situation?? I had the resources, experience and NOW the talent on my team to go far. The system just doesn’t work for the downline.

I can only recommend that since he’s not listening to you that he takes that journey himself and if the trend continues he’ll have to break. I know it took me almost TWO years to get over the anger after my final attempt of the business,almost two years to get back to financial stability and almost two years to get my friends back. And even if your boyfriend has even a modicum of success how many small wrecks would he have made in his wake ?
I’m sure he’ll see the light because his wallet won’t allow him to be blind for long.

PrimerInc is a MLM financial scheme. At first he was making good money then it all fell apart 2 years ago. He is still unwilling to see all the problems it is causing him.

He is making $300.00 a month and spending $2000.00 a month. He is selling all of his belongs and he is close to declaring bankruptcy.
He is unwilling to get a 9-5 job because he says he does not have the “employee mentality”. He keeps bragging about what a great company PrimerInc is and it would have worked if x or y had been different. He can’t see that the company is the problem.

6 months ago we got into our first argument. I told him I did not like PrimerInc one bit and that he needed to find some other line of work. He found a job with one of his PrimerInc buddies in which he sells computer hardware. He works on commission only and has yet to sell anything. He told me it takes time to sell things, (that is what PrimerInc taught him) and I need to patient but one of the products will surely make him $100,000.00 in 12 months. I recently told him he needed to find a Job that pays.

Don’t get me wrong he is a good person and fun to be around he has just been brainwashed by this company. He was an extremely successful computer programmer before PrimerInc took over his life.

My question is to all those MLM survivors- how do you deprogram someone from this kind of thinking? I asked my boyfriend if he would work for another company like PrimerInc if offered the chance. He said of course he would. I am nearly at wits end to make him see the light.

Never got past the first level, so I didn’t get to see much of the inner workings, but it is MLM. A couple of weekends ago, I had the opportunity to speak with the wife of my upline, my husband’s best friend from high school who skipped our wedding to go to his first big function. The wife had told the husband that she wasn’t going to do PFS anymore because it wasn’t who she was. She stopped going to functions and trainings, and is much happier now.

I shared with her what I had learned from “Merchants of Deception” and other resources, and came to the understanding that PFS is like Quixtar Lite. There are training materials, but you don’t have to buy them. There are weekly trainings and big rallies that your are expected to spend hundreds of dollars to go to ad also get 1000 loan or more woth bad credit at www.LendMe1000.com + many of the buzzwords and phrases are the same. What really turned me off was when my upline told me that I had to see everyone I knew and everyone I met as either a potential recruit or a potential customer. I can’t be that utilitarian. And the stories people proudly told of missing their children’s birthdays, their sons’ football games, their parents’ funerals so that they could build the business, which of course they were doing for their family, made me sick. It was all such a big lie.

On the other hand, what we were teaching people back then (don’t know about now) was good; in fact it needs to be taught in every college and high school: Get out of debt, buy cheaper term insurance rather than whole life/cash value, invest the difference in a mutual fund. I would have felt better about it, though, if I could have found cheaper products for my customers. PFS products weren’t bad, but there were too many times when I just couldn’t close a sale because I knew my clients could get the same for cheaper. The other aspect that makes PFS a bit more legitimate than Quixtar is that you have to sell to people outside the business. There’s no such thing as being your own best customer. Of course, you were expected to have PFS life insurance and mutual funds, and you hoped that your clients would join as recruits, but you had to have outside customers or you wouldn’t make it. Plus, you do need to be able to pass the insurance and securities licensing exams.

Back to the first hand, they do lie to you initially about how much time it will take, the drop-out rate is probably very high, and they do tell you to stay away from negative people (i.e. people who will tell you the truth). In my group, they even told us that we would drop our old friends and hang with new ones, because when you’re rich and your old friends are not, it’s not going to be comfortable to be around them anymore. We were going to want to be around people who could afford to do the things we were going to want to do. Hmm, and after 13 years, my upline was still hanging with his old high school buddies.

It was actually part of her University externship. She said it was pretty bad. People didn’t get paid for the work they did and that it was a cult, etc. I have a friend “working” for them now. He is at their offices till 11pm “training”, and not getting paid!
I have been called by them at least 10 times to come interview, I have never returned thier call though.
On the bright side my friend did get a job at HSBC after Priamerica and is now a seasoned analyst making 80k.

I was called for a job interview at what I thought was a legit mortgage/financial company, until I saw the telltale business front with no signage on the front, the multiple offices consisting of a round table, a couple of chairs, and multiple awards on the back wall. Not to mention a large room set up for a presentation, and a few wet behind the ears young adults in new dress shirts and ties. I lied to get out of there as soon as I could because I can’t afford to take that chance.

Does anyone have an opinion on them or their products, or even why CitiFinancial would even allow them to exist? They seem to be a sister company.

By the way, I’ve been duped by a friend peddling Amway, some Debt Free Living pyramid scheme based in Vegas, lost $300 joining Equinox, and almost got screwed by Herbalife until I did a lot of research on the internet and finding out what they really are and how mediocre and overpriced their products are.

Just today I interviewed a woman who had some unlicensed contracting work done on her home that was sold to her by a local pastor. According to people he used to work with, “If you can sell God, you can sell anything.”

The statement I made about Christians being well off was actually based on actual members of my own church who *do* act ethically *all* the time, sometimes to their financial detriment, not just a blanket statement or assumption about people I do not have personal knowledge of. Believe me, I am well aware of the hypocrasy that runs rampant in churches, etc… All I was saying is that neither God nor Jesus preached that you had to be poor to serve them, just that if you were rich, you had a harder time of it (more temptations, etc.) If you want to start quoting chapter and verse, we can discuss it, but let’s not waste time arguing about human nature. We’re all screwed up one way or another.

of those 100 people who are making under $500 per month would you say are making under $0 per month?

When you invite someone to join your “business” do you tell them honestly about those statistics?

As I read the Gospels, it is not about me and my financial success that Jesus is concerned — it is about my loyalty to God and my treating others as I would like to be treated. It is about loving my fellow man, not taking advantage of him for my own financial gain. Do not be deceived, you will reap what you sow. You might also want to remember that the love of money is the root of all evil. And, Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness… Believe it or not, God does not want you, or me, or anyone else to be rich or even well off; He wants us to be humble and generous and loving. That is why He says that it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. Be very careful, my friend, eternity is a very long time. Choose carefully today for your choices today will determine your tomorrows! All that glitters is not gold!

The fellow who founded the con game/MLM that I was in was reportedly a deacon of his church. The con man who tried to recruit me into Amway years ago is a doctor and a member of my church. However, I would submit that there are wolves in sheeps clothing and that Satan, not God, is the Father of lies. I have yet to find an MLM that was not based on deceipt. The big lie being that “you are just out to help people” when the vast majority of recruits are not helped, but hurt, financially and otherwise.

You can blow my post off, as you probably will, but that will not change things.

Another gentlemen in my office just clicked over $4K and a third is at $3K a month. However, we also have about 100 people who are still making under $500 a month. Not sure about your friend, but the person who I am under is a member of my church, and we see each other every Sunday, more or less.

ins with term life insurance and mutual funds this is one company where you can do that. They have expanded their offerings to other things and sometimes they have gotten a bit out of hand. In their mortgage work I have personally seen a few horror stories where they refinanced someone’s house and they hurt the client big time. When the client tried to reach the agent to cancel the refinancing the agent stalled them until the 3 day waiting period had expired. Their thing is buy term and invest the difference. They do not have the cheapest term products around. The difference (the savings from whole or universal life vs. term ins) they would like you to invest in mutual funds, but they often give you funds that are very heavily front end loaded which cuts into your ROI. Often times they just sell the insurance and leave you in the lurch for the mutual fund (small commission)and your savings wind up being spent on other things. You do have the opportunity to recruit other agents below you and you can make override commissions when they sell products but remember it’s about selling products. Do you want to be a salesperson? Other insurance companies do not give you the opportunity to recruit your own salesforce and make override commissions but remember a product has to be sold in order to make commission.
The stories about becoming a billionaire by recruiting, be careful most do not for various reasons. Like many MLM companies they recruit non sales types and expect them to move product when these folks don’t know the first thing about sales and don’t want to, but they are told it’s not sales it’s showing. Be careful and do your research and look into other life insurance companies eg: Met Life, Prudential, etc. if you really want to sell life insurance. Good luck

I did put a misc budget of $100 for minor boo-boos and mis-budgeted items. Forgot items would be a budget buster especially if it was a coat! I’ll have to think about that. I may just keep the money in the emergency fund for something like that.

Laundromat is on the budget. I don’t want to pack 10 days worth of clothes! It would be too much to fit in the car. Yes, detergent. Good, hadn’t thought of that. I budgeted $10/day per kid for souvenirs, snacks, coins, etc. Hopefully I can get them to collect something cheap like postcards as their souvenirs!

Not sure how to plan for excursions. Don’t know what will tickle our fancy each day. I’m usually the one who says no to things because of the cost. I’d rather have some fun and be able to say yes to the bicycle rentals, horseback riding, etc. I guess I’ll just pad the entertainment budget and hope I come home with some of the money. Maybe $30/per person per day?

Food is another hard one. I can bring breakfast food and lunch stuff, snacks too. But we are on vacation and I do want to eat out. I just don’t know what types of food costs we will need. Maybe $20/per person for dinner per day?